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David H. Getches

August 17, 1942 - July 5, 2011

Posted:
07/31/2011 01:00:00 AM MDT

David Getches, a scholar and authority on natural resources, water law, and Indian law, and former Dean of the University of Colorado Law School, died of pancreatic cancer on July 5, at the age of 68. He was born in Abington, Pennsylvania on August 17, 1942, the son of Ruth and George Getches. He had one sister, Meredith, who passed away in 2008. He received his B.A from Occidental College and his J.D. degree from the University of Southern California Law School.

In 1970, Getches served as Founding Executive Director of the Native American Rights Fund (NARF), a public-interest law firm in Boulder, Colorado. Getches joined the University of Colorado Law School faculty in 1978, where he held the Raphael J.

Moses Professorship in Natural Resources Law, and taught environmental law, water law, public land law, and Indian law. He took a leave of absence from 1983 to 1987 to serve as Executive Director of the Colorado Department of Natural Resources in the administration of Governor Richard Lamm.

As a professor, Getches authored casebooks, as well as books intended for a more general audience — such as Water Law in a Nutshell (1997) and Federal Indian Law (1998).

Getches was appointed Dean of the Law School in 2003. As Dean, Getches increased the academic offerings at the law school, raised over $33.1 million in donations, and increased the law school's endowment 110 percent from 2003, achieving his goal to greatly expand law student scholarship offerings. He oversaw the construction of the new $46 million, LEED certified, Wolf Law Building completed in 2006. In May 2011, Getches was awarded the Robert L. Stearns Award from the University of Colorado.

Getches served on numerous nonprofit boards, including the Board of Trustees of the Grand Canyon Trust, the Governing Council of the Wilderness Society, the Board of Directors of Defenders of Wildlife, and the Board of Trustees of the Rocky Mountain Mineral Law Foundation, as well as the boards of the Natural Resources Law Center at Colorado Law, American Rivers, the Trust for Public Land, the Colorado Water Trust, and the Land and Water Fund of the Rockies (LAW Fund), among others.

David Getches is survived by his wife Ann, his son Matthew, daughters Catherine and Elizabeth, and grandchildren Harrison, Benjamin and

Owen.

A memorial service will be held at 5PM on Thursday, August 11, in the courtyard of the Wolf Law Building.

People who wish to honor David may send a donation for the David H. Getches Scholarship Fund at the University of Colorado Law School. Donations should be made payable to the CU Foundation and sent to: CU Foundation Processing, 4740 Walnut Street, Boulder, CO 80301.

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